🔧 BUILD Shawns 1971 Impala Donk

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Interior/Top
LS Swap
Wheels
Sounds/Music
Suspension/Brakes
Paint
BOOST TIME!!!!

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Well boys and girls my new project is finally home. Ive always had a hard on for the Donks (71-76 Caprice or Impala) and always told myself since 1994 that I was eventually going to build one. My buddy mike at the time had a 74 Caprice Vert with 30's and Vouges (google them if you dont know what they are) basically 30 spoke cragars and vouge tires. Its a classic old school gangster look. Over the years he built a few more and sold them and always offered them to me first and I declined because of my love of G Body's as well. When I bought the Regal a couple years ago, I really looked hard at the Donks and believe it or not they were going for half of what they are going for now. Even last summer they coulda been had for about a 1/3rd less maybe a little less for what they are going for now. I was set on a 71 or a 75 for 2 reasons. 71 is the most sought after and fetches the most money as its known as the ACE. 75 because it was the year I was born, and thought that would be pretty cool. Didnt care if it was a HT or Vert, kinda preferred that HT as I dont think Chgo weather is weather for Verts. Pay a extra $10k for a Vert, no thanks.

So when my buddy and I made a deal for the Regal months ago and I knew he was serious. I got serious in my search for a donk. As most of you know I went to Miami for 4 days last month. Had a shit load of them lined up to look at and found either garbage or guys that wouldnt move off what I thought was too high of a price. Few that I thought were too high, have actually sold since then, so I'm thinking price wasnt too high. While in Miami I met this dude Josh and him and I clicked and became friends. Super cool white boy who is in to donks as well, not generally something you see white boys building. He told me he would keep his eyes and ears open and if close enough would do the leg work for me. But told me if he found something I would have to hi-tail my ass down there asap as when they are priced right they sell in hours. Just so happened we decided to go down to Orlando this weekend because we found $61 RT airfare and the biggest donk/g body show just was going on. Figured I might be able to buy something there. Called Josh to tell him we were coming down and if he planned on taking his car to Orlando. He said he might know of a 71 going up for sale with a motivated buyer. I said well fuck let me know asap.

Touched down in Orlando Friday night and had to be up early Saturday to cruise to Ft Lauderdale to see this 71. Pull up to this gated community with $1m+ townhomes and get buzzed in by security. Pull up to the house and she was sitting in driveway and looked as clean as the pics I was sent. Took it for a ride, BSing with Josh, my buddy Ralphy and the owner of the car. Talking about everything from sports to woman to cars. Come to find out this rich fuck is a collector and has 2 other 71's besides the one I bought, and just purchased another on top of 6-7 other cars he has. I guess the Wife has a rule, every time he gets a new one something has to go lol. While BSing I kinda feel him out and get the idea he doesnt want this car going to a black guy who is going to ruin it with big wheels and a LS swap lol. So I played my white privilege card with him. He was asking $25k and very easily had him down to $20k. My final offer was $17.5k and he said he would sleep on it. Told him if he agreed in the morning then it was his job to get it to Orlando before Sunday night. He woke me up about 8am saying the car was mine and was on the way to Orlando. He showed up, we exchanged cash and paperwork, took it off the trailer and parked it at my Airbnb. We were going out for the day/night, so I pulled the coil so the fucker wouldnt start in case someone wanted to steal it lol. Also backed it in so a tow truck would have a hard time stealing it as well.

Talked to a few of the Chgo guys down there for the show and got lucky as one of the haulers had room for me to get her home. Car was dropped off in Midlothian today at $how and Go Customz and turns out Playboy a friend of mine just opened that shop up. Does nothing but suspension and motor work. Talked pricing about shortening my rear end, coilovers all the way around, new axels and adjustable control arms to squat this car. Basically a "California Lean". Front end will sit at stock height with a 26" rim and the rear end will squat 3-4" lower. I have some 26" Billets but probably going to put new barrels on the rear rims. Right now they are a 5.5" lip and I want that 7" lip on the rear, hence the reason for shortening the rear end. Most of you think of Donk and think of those 71-76 sitting on fucking 4x4 suspensions with 30" wheels. Yes those are donks as well, but not the look I'm shooting for.

FESTER665

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I really like the dash and I'm so happy I went with this one and waited the 12-14 weeks or whatever it was.
I originally bought the one pictured below, then a few weeks later they were advertising the one that I now have.
Supposedly I rcvd the first one from Dakota. I know nobody in Chgo has it in their Donk yet.
The one I have keeps it more of an OG look

View attachment 99638

Yeah, I ended up doing the same after Dakota worked with LMR to make one more stock looking for Fox bodies as well.

Things are looking great!
 
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Shawn1112

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So its been a while on for an update. Just been driving the car and enjoying it. This fucker has no issues climbing north of 100mph and riding smooth as shit.
When you have over $5k tied up in the suspension, I guess you should expect that lol.

Got nowhere with trying to get my tilt column replaced. In fact the guy is in jail and his GF is now running the biz.
So I found an old timer in AZ that completely rebuilds/refinishes tilt columns using 100% OEM parts. Ordered it mid Sept and it just shipped today due to back ordered parts.

Gave my interior guy $500 to hold my spot and to go find me power bucket seats. He is hoping to get me in end of this month. I was 100% going to keep the bench, but the more I drive the car, its just not comfortable at all. Also, found out the hard way, if I'm hammered the Wifey cant drive it home. The center console wont allow the bench to move up enough so she can reach the pedals. Plan is all black leather, with stitching to match the paint. Center console will be similar to my Regal, it will go from front to back and have an Ipad holder in it. Custom front kick panels with 5.25" mids and tweeters (component set). Might throw some bullet tweeters in the dash location that houses the factory 6x9. I'll have to figure out how to make a bracket to hold them. So obviously I'll have to add another amp for more mids/highs. Debating on white or red accent lighting in the interior.

Paint is locked in, deposit also paid to hold my spot, scheduled for Jan 25th. I'm using Rolandos in Elk Grove, super cool dudes and they are car guys before business owners if that makes sense. They have painted 2 friends cars who came out really nice. Not disclosing the color, but it going to be bad ass imo. The flake pops super hard in the sun. Its one of those colors (not a flip flop) but pending how the light hits it, it looks like a different color. Its actually a factory color off a pickup from a certain manufacturer lol. Every single piece of trim will come off the car including the glass. All the trim is heading to Florida to some chick who is bad ass at repair and re-polishing. If your on IG look up The Trim Lady
He looked over my car very well, seen one spot of concern, that I knew was there. But barring any other unforeseen shit, he said the car needs more block work than body work. He said its insanely clean for being 50yrs old.
 

Shawn1112

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Dang sounds nice. Would they scuff your existing paint and paint over it?
It will be scuffed, just not taken down to the bare metal as its not needed.
They will also be priming with Featherfill and blocking that. He has like 32hrs of block work factored in.
Removing the factory wheel wells and painting those satin black along with the inner header panel.
 

Shawn1112

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I'll probably regret this, but I turned down a $50k cash offer Saturday night. Not drunk talk either we were far from drunk, $50k cash was basically was put on a table we were sitting at. My Dad was with me as well, and he looked at me and called me a fucking idiot when I said no, lol.
Same person also offered me $40k and a LS swapped (low mileage 5.3 built for boost) 1988 super clean Chevy Caprice. Has about $6k in music in it as well, but needs paint, wheels, suspension and interior. It was a full top though, had it been a LS or Landeau I might have actually gave that some though.
 
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1quick

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I'll probably regret this, but I turned down a $50k cash offer Saturday night. Not drunk talk either we were far from drunk, $50k cash was basically was put on a table we were sitting at. My Dad was with me as well, and he looked at me and called me a fucking idiot when I said no, lol.
Same person also offered me $40k and a LS swapped (low mileage 5.3 built for boost) 1988 super clean Chevy Caprice. Has about $6k in music in it as well, but needs paint, wheels, suspension and interior. It was a full top though, had it been a LS or Landeau I might have actually gave that some though.
I’d assume that’s probably the going rate for a car like yours, have your fun with it and get the same later when your bored
 
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Shawn1112

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Would you be profitable with the 50k? And if it did go down what would you build next?
Yes, but not a big enough profit that would make me entertain the $50K. I’ve wanted to build a 71 or 75 Caprice/Impala since I was 19 so that plays a part as well. When I do sell it, my next is going to be a 63 or 64 Impala SS 2dr hardtop and I will build a lowrider.
 

Shawn1112

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So just an update on my sounds. I've never been happy the way I should have been with the bass in this car. Highs/mids are incredible and I'm actually adding a Hertz component set of 6.5's with tweets in custom kick panels and 2 more Hertz ST25 horns in custom rear enclosures when the interior gets done. Think if sitting in the back seat, where your outside elbow would be for location of the horns

Back to the bass issue. When we talked about the box design and setup, he talked me into a blow by, meaning it would be ported thru the rear deck to get most of the bass into the cabin of the car. We also talked about doing the box in birchwood, in fact I paid extra for it. So the bass has never hit as hard as I felt it should, he said when he tuned it, he kept the gains down as we didnt know the history of the subs. Told me after a month or so, come back in and he will turn it up and it will hit hard as shit. Well, I just never had the time and wanted to cruise the couple of months I had and figured I would address it myself come winter time.

Last week the bass was getting worse, so I removed the beauty panels to take a look. Noticed one of my sub amps the gains were all the way down and the other was pretty high. I'm like WTF, why did he do that. One amp was hot AF and one sub was barely playing. Call another buddy who is a whiz at this shit and competes in SPL competitions and right now is like top 10 in the country. He said to send him pics and a video, he calls me and say the box is the issue. Starting talking like rain man with all these numbers and XXXX this and XXXX this and it doesnt equal XXXX. So I tell him, I'll run the car by you and we can go over it together. I'm better at understanding shit when I see it explained to me in person. Shoot out to his house and he starts explaining everything to me. Basically the way the box was built, the port in my rear deck needed to be like 30" wide and it was 10" wide lol. It was a 1-1 ratio box and shoulda been a 3-1 ratio box. On top of that, the subs should have been mounted inverted for my application and they werent. Tell him, I'll leave the car with him, build me a rear firing, rear ported box as I'm not having a 30" wide port in my rear deck.

He starts tearing the old box out 2 days ago and this MFer didnt pre-drill any of the screws so there were cracks all over. On top of that, he didnt use the birchwood I bought, he built 90% of it out of particle board. He used the birchwood only up front where you could see it, everything else was wrapped in black vinyl. Box wasnt sealed correctly either.

Car should be done tonight with a new rear firing/rear ported box.
 

Jon01

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WTF is it with shops being cheap AF when they really don't need to be. I just don't get it.
It is really hard to find good shops anymore and I think part of that is due to lack of available good help. People just DGAF anymore.
Glad you have a guy to lean on Shawn, hopefully he gets this shit straightened out for ya.
 

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